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Altuve, the American League player of the month for July, has become the gold standard for second baseman this year. He led the big leagues with a .365 average and the American League with a .426 OBP heading into Thursday. Barney shouldn’t be mentioned in the same breath but he’s on a little hot streak —8-for-23 over the past week with four doubles, five runs and four RBIs.

NEED TO KNOW

The Blue Jays and the Astros split a four-game series at the Rogers Centre in July, with Houston inflicting a 19-1 loss on Toronto in the finale . . . The visitors will look to take advantage of a long list of Astros on the disabled list: pitchers Lance McCullers Jr. (back), Tony Sipp (calf), Michael Feliz (shoulder) and Will Harris (shoulder), shortstop Carlos Correa (thumb) and right fielder George Springer (quad) . . . This will be the first meeting between Francisco Liriano and Toronto since the lefty and cash were sent to Houston in exchange for Nori Aoki and Teoscar Hernandez at the trade deadline.

ON DECK

Three games against the New York Yankees at Rogers Centre, starting on Tuesday.

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